Semiconductor transistors are a basic building block of today's integrated circuits. Such transistors are typically formed in conventional bulk semiconductor substrates (such as silicon) or in a semiconductor layer of a semiconductor-on-insulator (SOI) substrate. As integrated circuits such as memory circuits, logic circuits and the like are formed to have higher and higher integration density, the size of various structures of field effect transistors (FETs), such as metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect transistors (MOSFETs) and complementary metal oxide semiconductors (CMOS), are being reduced. Such down-scaling of these devices achieves compactness and may improve operating performance by reducing the overall dimensions of the device. However, such down-scaling may also make the transistors more susceptible to electrical failures as processing margins are reduced.